The term “informatics” has been used in various different contexts in medicine. In radiology, “informatics” may be used to refer to management of digital images, typically in the form of a picture archiving and communication system (PACS), and so the term “imaging informatics” may be more accurate. Systems for this type of management include Philips's IntelliSense™ PACS, Siemens's Syngo™ framework, and GE's Centricity™ PACS and Imaging Analytics products, among others, and the focus of these systems is generally limited to the storage, organization, and access of DICOM images.
In a surgical context, on the other hand, “informatics” has been used to refer to a broad and diverse range of operating room aspects. GE offers perioperative software that helps manage operating room (OR) scheduling, anesthesia documentation, surgical supplies, and throughput. NDS offers a series of products (e.g., ConductOR™, ScaleOR™, and ZeroWire™) focused on OR video streaming and distribution. Karl Storz's OR1 informatics platform is also centered on OR endoscopic video. Stryker offers iSuite™, which manages video, surgical lights, booms, and surgical navigation devices.
Other, more specialized, informatics systems exist in the cardiovascular space, consolidating various cardiac images (e.g., echocardiograms, X-rays, magnetic resonance (MR) images, etc.) along with electrocardiogram (ECG) and electrophysiology results. The intent is to consolidate the plethora of data that comes from a variety of sources into a central place so that it is readily available to the clinician (e.g., the cardiologist, the cardiac surgeon, or another care provider) in its entirety, facilitating more informed decisions regarding a patient's care. Philips Xcelera™ and GE's Centricity™ Cardio are two commercially-available cardiovascular informatics systems.
As for other specialized surgical informatics platforms, Voyent Healthcare developed an orthopedic informatics solution over the mid to late 2000s. It features integrated orthopedic implant planning, web-based viewing, card swipe access, and operating room scheduling.
Contrary to the cardiovascular and orthopedic spaces, the specialized neurological/neurosurgical informatics landscape is sparse and underserved, despite the need and high demand among neurosurgeons for real-time information that can inform them on important clinical decisions before, during, and after surgery. This could be attributed to several key differences between the surgical disciplines, most notably the comparatively fewer imaging studies performed in neurosurgical procedures, which, in most cases, is limited to pre-operative MR or CT. However, with the growing demand and adoption of minimally invasive neurological procedures that require new sophisticated imaging tools for accurate guidance, this trend is quickly changing.
Thus there is a need for integrating multi-modality imaging solutions that will take visualization, planning, and navigation, in pre-operative, intra-operative, and post-operative contexts to the next level to provide better care for patients.